~$120 CFast to SSD solution

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Michael McCaffrey

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~$120 CFast to SSD solution

PostSun Feb 28, 2016 5:50 pm

Anyone tried this?



http://www.microsatacables.com/cfast-breakout-cable

The cable is $68. A power solution is about $60 he said, so about $120-$130 total to use SSDs with the Ursa cameras.
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Dave Perry

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Re: ~$120 CFast to SSD solution

PostSun Feb 28, 2016 6:47 pm

I'm not really sure what the point is or why anyone would want to do this with a camera of this calibre. Other than just to do it for the sake of trying it, it certainly doesn't make sense on a professional level to introduce another link in the data acquisition chain that can fail and is not supported by the manufacturer.
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Michael McCaffrey

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Re: ~$120 CFast to SSD solution

PostSun Feb 28, 2016 7:01 pm

Well apparently a lot of people like to do it with the C-Box system. This a fraction of the price.
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Jason R. Johnston

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Re: ~$120 CFast to SSD solution

PostMon Feb 29, 2016 2:28 pm

If "low cost" is your main criteria, this sort of thing would be fine...but then why buy an Ursa?
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Gene Kochanowsky

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Re: ~$120 CFast to SSD solution

PostMon Feb 29, 2016 3:52 pm

Jason R. Johnston wrote:If "low cost" is your main criteria, this sort of thing would be fine...but then why buy an Ursa?


Perhaps because for what it is, it is low cost?
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Ryan Humphrey

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Re: ~$120 CFast to SSD solution

PostMon Feb 29, 2016 3:56 pm

Depending on how much storage you need, the CFast cards could approach the cost of the camera, and they are individually not very large. For someone who wants to record longer continuous takes and even just avoid the hassle of swapping out and keeping track of a lot of cards this would make sense to me.
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Jason R. Johnston

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Re: ~$120 CFast to SSD solution

PostMon Feb 29, 2016 4:26 pm

Gene Kochanowsky wrote:
Jason R. Johnston wrote:If "low cost" is your main criteria, this sort of thing would be fine...but then why buy an Ursa?


Perhaps because for what it is, it is low cost?


Not really. Sure, compared to an Alexa...but, if $7000 is a lot of money to someone, then an Ursa might as well have the same price tag as an Alexa.

So, you go spend $7000 on a new camera (and by "you" I mean an imaginary protagonist). But, you didn't also think about how much media and batteries and storage and processing cost. Total cost of the entire package, starting from scratch, might wind up being twice the price of just the camera. So, you got the camera, but you don't have the additional ~$5000 for the other bits you need to make it work properly. So you start cutting corners. Sure, you can make it work until you can afford something better, and I can see that attitude with cages, shoulder rigs, remote controls, and other peripherals, but not things like reels and juice. And that's assuming you have the glass already, or can procure it.

It's like those dudes that got tired of waiting for the BMCC and announced they'd go buy a used Red One on ebay for $8000. Sure, that's great, but what about the other $10000 in peripherals and computer hardware you'd need to make it work? Yeah, but I got a Red One. Well, good for you. Thumbs up, babycakes.

You introduce another cable, another point of contact, another link in the chain, and it only adds to the "just one more thing" that could go wrong, as if cameras and movie-making themselves weren't already precarious enough. Especially on a one-man-crew like I am most of the time. I need everything to just work. If this were a hobby, maybe sure...but as a professional...I just couldn't.

So, like I said, if money is your concern, sure: go for it. But then, there are cameras with cheaper ecosystems than Ursa. BMD Production Camera uses SSDs and Ursa had the same sensor up until recently. There's a few Sony cameras that work just fine. And if you're not shooting raw, and I doubt the OP is, then there are definitely more economic options out there.

Now, if you're looking at Ursa as the first step into a more professional workflow, great, but as I said, you should have budgeted for at least one solid Cfast2 card to go with the initial purchase. Hopefully, the OP has some AC experience and knows how to wrangle cables properly.
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Gene Kochanowsky

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Re: ~$120 CFast to SSD solution

PostMon Feb 29, 2016 5:34 pm

Frankly, as image size and frame rate go up, even a dual cfast 2.0 card is not gonna cut it. I'm surprised that BM didn't adopt pcie.

Here is a part, ~$328/512GB with a write speed of 1,500 MB/s, almost 4 times a cfast 2.0 3600x.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... oCrtDw_wcB
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Michael McCaffrey

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Re: ~$120 CFast to SSD solution

PostThu Mar 03, 2016 2:32 am

I bet we'll see some cameras at NAB that use pcie. That'd be nice.
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Tristan Pemberton

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Re: ~$120 CFast to SSD solution

PostThu Mar 03, 2016 11:06 am

Gene Kochanowsky wrote:Frankly, as image size and frame rate go up, even a dual cfast 2.0 card is not gonna cut it. I'm surprised that BM didn't adopt pcie.

Here is a part, ~$328/512GB with a write speed of 1,500 MB/s, almost 4 times a cfast 2.0 3600x.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... oCrtDw_wcB


Yeah, I don't think so. That is a piece of hardware designed to be installed in an enclosure once, and then left alone. It would be extremely sensitive to static and not robust enough for the rigours of cinematography. I certainly wouldn't be trusting my lively hood (captured images) to something like that.

The data rate is impressive though.
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Gene Kochanowsky

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Re: ~$120 CFast to SSD solution

PostThu Mar 03, 2016 12:52 pm

To place an enclosure around it would be trivial.

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